The 12 days of GCHQ quizmas: test your brain power with these daily puzzles

This article was taken from the February 2013 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.

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Children's rooms across the country are littered with well-meaning but unloved "edutainment" toys. But Skylar Tibbits, an architect and lecturer at MIT, has designed one that's educational, aesthetically satisfying and fun.

Pictured above are self-folding protein strands. A series of interlinked pieces of plastic with elastic threaded through them, they begin as a rigid, stretched-out line, but throw them in the air and they recombine to form a protein shape, giving a vivid sense of biological forms. "You learn how these structures work in an intuitive and visual way," says Tibbits. Potentially, using 3D-printing software, you could design and build your own vast protein chains.

The protein can be folded into biological forms

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Tibbits is working with Objet, a Boston-based rapid prototyping company with multi-material 3D printers, to expand the chains' potential. They hope to eventually see self-assembling structures being used in logistically problematic environments such as outer space or disaster zones. "People ask me, 'Is this art or architecture or science?'" says Tibbits. "It doesn't matter. The most interesting things are at the intersection of disciplines."